Just finished a thought-provoking book, What got you here won’t get you there by Marshall Goldsmith. He talks about characteristics of successful people: they know they have been successful, they “know” they are now successful, and believe they will be successful in the future. For the most part, a very good recipe for continued success. But frequently what makes you great at X and Y doesn’t make you equally great at X and Y and Z.Goldsmith is an executive level coach that uses 360-degree feedback to create personal coaching for successful execs. Usually the CEO has called Goldsmith in because George Successful has a glaring flaw that makes him unpromotable. So the book highlights 20 habits that people may have formed that stand in their way to advance. It might be (not) listening; it might be taking the credit that subordinates deserve; it might be playing favorites; it might be 17 other things.
I read the book once and found lots of reason for introspection. I will definitely read it a second time. Gratefully, it isn’t just a book about how people can get off track; it’s also very explicit in describing what a stymied person can do to get unstuck. I am recommending this book to colleagues that feel stuck, stymied, or want to take their career to the next level. It will benefit those that are willing to take a look in the mirror.

The characters are immediately interesting and familiar. This wasn’t a book that I had to read the first 100 pages to decide if I would keep going. It’s not light-hearted reading, and those that are tender hearted might want to take a pass.

I just read a book by Jim Harrison, Returning to Earth. I recommend it, in a quiet way. It has a thread of native american traditions told by characters that aren’t that involved with it, or don’t fully understand, and that makes it interesting. Is this what it would feel like to be a Native American in the Upper Peninsula today? It also tells the story of a family in grief, and processing the before, during and after issues of a tragic illness and death. In some ways there is little drama, but the tone is interesting and calm throughout.

I picked this book up at Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe as an employee recommendation. It is young adult fiction, but I am reminded how much I liked the onslaught of young adult fiction that I had to read in that ASU course taught by Dr. Ken Donelson. The memory is dim, but the Chocolate War by Robert Cormier seems like a representative example. Dr. KD was competent and cool.
So, this book was good. Set in Sydney, it has several quirks in vocabulary and local flavor that will keep you on your toes. It features 4 characters at the core that don’t seem to have a lot going for them. One of them gets “selected” to address some unaddressed issues in the neighborhood. It is not predictable, and even if I wasn’t pulled along every step of the way, there was a payoff for me towards the end. Worthwhile.

Peter Mulvey’s cd is a variable mix, like a Joe Niekro knuckleball fluttering up to the plate. The most memorable song for me is the one that is most sparse, Thorn. It is just a few words, a simple poem really, overlaid with a longing melody. A woman in some corner of cyberspace wrote that she wanted to learn the song to sing to her spouse on their wedding day. Nice Nice.

The Sociopath Next Door, by Martha Stout, grabbed my attention walking through a Borders. Three sets of female eyes peer out from the cover, and it is like a long ago quiz show: which one of us is a criminal? The book itself proved even more interesting because it shares the concept that there are people with a personality disorder that doesn’t allow them to experience remorse or guilt for their actions. For personal reasons, this book was like finding a flashlight in my backpack on a moonlight night. It helped me make sense of a lot of mysterious territory in my life. http://www.curledup.com/sociopat.htm

He writes prose that flows like music. He writes of Newfoundland in a way that makes an Arizonan occasionally but not permanently enticed to a hard, cold, scrabble of an island. If I wanted to sample his work, understanding he is an acquired taste, I would start with The Bird Artist.

Moon grows a little.

Each night it rises later.

Eating out of sight?